Chances are if you are breathing, you may need life insurance. So many times I see clients in one of two situations, not enough life insurance or the wrong kind of life insurance.
We want to use life insurance as a tool to spread the risk away from ourselves and to others. We want to use it to help our loved ones survive financially after we have died, We do not want to use insurance as an investment. We want to use investments as investments such a mutual funds, stocks and securities, not whole life or universal life or cash valued policies. We can do so much better for ourselves if we invest in good growth and income mutual funds.
We want to purchase good term life insurance that would cover our expenses at a rate of eight our ten time our current expenses. Then if we died, our loved ones would receive these death benefits, tax -free and could invest them in something safe and then receive income for over an extended period. This would be true if we were single, married, with kids or without kids. If we are leaving someone behind that depends upon us, we should carry life insurance to take care of them.
Once we have paid for all of our assets and have no debt and 8 to 10 times our expenses in investments and savings, then we can be self- insured and drop our term insurance.
If you do not have insurance and are pretty healthy, now is a great time to get insurance. If you would happen to develop an illness such as heart disease, diabetes, or cancer, you could be denied life insurance in the future.
Another insurance to look into once you are over 60 years old is long- term care insurance. This policy would take care of you if you ever had to be cared for in a long- term care facility such as a nursing home.
Some insurance to avoid other than cash value insurance is cancer insurance and accidental death insurance. These situations are already covered in your regular policy.
Last but not lease, keep communicating with your insurance agent. Make sure they are aware of any life changes you have such as health, marital status, goals kids and more. If your agent can’t or wont sit down with you and talk with you one on one in a way you can understand, get a new agent who can and has the heart of a teacher.
Stop by www.lifehappens.org for more info about life insurance.
